It’s been a badge of honor — the retaliatory sanctions that Russia has announced against certain American politicians since the U.S. imposed its own sanctions on Russia.

And Sen. John McCain of Arizona has been wearing it proudly.

With a characteristic sense of humor.

Today, the former prisoner-of-war whose plane was shot down over Vietnam took his humor a step further in the midst of discussions over the sanctions likely to follow in the aftermath of the shooting down of a Malaysian airliner over a Russian-backed, separatist-controlled area of eastern Ukraine.

The Arizona Republican was asked by Wolf Blitzer, CNN’s lead political anchor, about the sanctions Russia had imposed against him and eight other U.S. officials in response to Washington’s actions against Moscow.